Top 5 Mobile Apps for Holiday Shoppers

by Darryl Taft

WootWatch, although not Woot’s official app, is a great way to bring the essential Woot.com information to a mobile device screen and make purchases easy. Its tagline: “We keep track of your favorite one item per day Website so you won’t miss out on a great deal today or tomorrow.” For the thrifty shopper this season, WootWatch is a great app to use on the commute.

MasterCard’s Priceless Picks is a mashup of augmented reality and consumer-generated content that can highlight location-specific businesses and promotions. It is an initial step toward the rapidly approaching convergence of mobile, social and commerce. It’s also a great app for finding a deal.

The Amazon Cart application is a great simplified version of the Amazon.com shopping experience. It’s synchronized with your Amazon cart and allows for one-click “Buy Now” purchases. With mobile commerce enabled by Amazon, we should see the biggest holiday sales on mobile devices to date.

The App Store offers the ability to purchase apps with only a few clicks. Apple’s simplified payment system makes it extremely efficient and addictive to purchase applications while on the go. This season, you can purchase apps like G-Park (you’ll never forget where you parked), the Mint.com (you’ll know your real-time account balance and can even identify expenditures by category), or Save Benjis (after you take a picture of something you want, it will find comparable online prices for you).

AroundMe aggregates restaurants, cash machines, coffee shops, etc., and finds the closest location for you. It will help shoppers who are out and about this season, seeking either a nice place for a lunch break, or if you need to find the closest ATM.